


Chapter One “Moving Pictures”

by Dynogadget



Series: BATIM Charlotte's au [2]
Category: Bendy and the Ink Machine
Genre: Charlotte's au, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-29
Updated: 2021-01-12
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:00:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,624
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28411311
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dynogadget/pseuds/Dynogadget
Summary: This is just chapter one in game but with Charlie Stein instead of Henry Stein.
Series: BATIM Charlotte's au [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2069577
Comments: 5
Kudos: 5





	1. Part 1: Back From the Past

This place was definitely creepy but she was here for a reason and she was going to find out what Joey wanted her to see. Charlie sighed trying to get rid of her fear and looked back down at the postcard Joey had sent her. It read:

Dear Charlie,

It seems like a lifetime since we worked on cartoons together. 30 years really slips away, doesn’t it.

If you’re back in town, come visit the old workshop. There’s something I need to show you.

Your best pal,

Joey Drew

She put the postcard back in her pocket before saying out loud “Alright Joey. I’m here. Let’s see if we can find what you wanted me to see.” And even though the studio had power and the lights were on, the place still looked a bit dark which didn’t help any of her fears, but she decided that if she were to get anywhere she would have to push past those fears and start looking around for answers.

A little while after exploring she managed to find her old art desk which remained just as she remembered it, the first sketches she ever made of bendy still lying on top of its surface. As a smile crept across her face and so many fond memories rushed into her head as she said “Hey, here’s my old desk. I’ve wasted so much time in this chair.” She picked up the sheet of paper and stuffed it in her pocket as she reminisced about some of the old days and how she would waste hours even after work drawing her heart out. Sometimes that would get her in trouble when she would end up getting sick due to lack of sleep, or when her passion for art ended up with her losing her ex-boyfriend. Though the later wasn’t completely her fault, she still felt so much better that he was no longer a constraint in her life.

But by now Charlie realized that if she were to get anywhere she would have to stop living in the past and start looking around for whatever Joey wanted her to see. After a while of searching she came across a room with a large lift in it and she really couldn’t see the bottom. After a short examination of the mechanism she thought a little out loud saying “This lift could use a few dry cells.” She found some power cells to plug in and turn it on before sighing “Let’s see what you’re hiding down there, old friend.” And when she did turn it on she wasn’t entirely sure what she was seeing, as a large machine with large black pipes under it came rising from the floor. Was this what Joey wanted her to see, some giant machine that she really didn’t know what it did? Well she wasn’t going to find out what it was by just staring at it, maybe turning it on would help her figure out this mystery she thought to herself. But something about it didn’t seem right. Maybe it was the large pipes that ran under it or maybe it was the fact that it took up the size of a small room, but something about it felt almost, evil.

She left the room to go explore some more and hopefully find the power to turn on that machine, but nothing stood out to her until she came across something almost horrifying. “Oh my god. Joey, what were you doing?” she asked, shocked at what lay before her. It was Boris the wolf, the cartoon character but somehow real. And the worst part was that he was lying on a tilted dissection table strapped down with his chest open and his ribs jutting out of the sides of the open chest cavity. Aside from a wrench sticking out, his chest was completely empty. This was a horrific scene for anyone to see and Charlie was finding it hard to even truly comprehend what was going on. But no matter how she felt now, she still was going to follow her original plan, to turn on that machine and hopefully find Joey so she could get some answers.

Charlie left the room to go and find the power switch, but on her search she found an old tape recorder lying on a shelf. It already had a cassette tape in it labeled “Wally Franks” with a recorded message, so she decided where’s the harm in playing it, and thankfully it had some answers she was looking for. She pressed play and then a voice came out saying:

“At this point, I don’t get what Joey’s plan is for this company. The animations sure aren’t being finished on time anymore. And I certainly don’t see why we need this machine. It’s noisy, it’s messy, and who needs that much ink anyway?

Also, get this. Joey had each one of us donate something from our work station. We put them on these little pedestals in the breakroom to help appease the gods, Joey says. Keep things going.

I think he’s lost his mind, but hey, he writes the checks.

But I tell you what, if one more of these pipes burst, I’m out of here.”

So there was one question answered. What she saw was the fabled ink machine she had heard about before when she worked here, but never really got to see it for herself only heard stuff about it. In fact at least once a week someone would complain to Joey about another ink pipe bursting and he would have to try and get someone else to fix it. But that also answered the other question of how to turn it on because she knew exactly where the switch was and how to turn it on. It was turned on by putting the “offerings” from all of their work stations on the pedestals and then you could just flip the switch and only then would it turn on. She saw Joey do it multiple times but never really asked why. There were a lot of weird things that Joey did and Charlie never really asked why which she now realized was a mistake. Leaving the tape recorder there she made her way over to the breakroom to find out what she needed to get.


	2. Part 2: Turn On The Machine

When she entered the break room she exclaimed “Alright! How do I get this to work?” and soon noticed six pedestals each with their own portrait of what would go on the pedestals behind them and a giant switch on the far wall. Taking a better look at the portraits she listed off what she needed to get.

“A wrench, a cog, a record, an ink bottle, a bendy plushie, and a book.”

Charlie had previously seen the wrench in Borris’s open chest, saw a cog in a tool box next to one of the batteries she needed to turn on the lift, knew she always had a spare bottle of ink at her old desk, and knew that there would be a record in the old music directors upstairs office. But the plush and book would be a bit harder to find seeing as those were common items here in the studio so they might be anywhere. She went to leave but was startled at the sight of a Bendy wooden cut out standing right infront of her.

“Who put this here?!” she said with a little ebb of fear in her voice. But trying to push past it she went straight for Borris to get that wrench.

Seeing the cartoon figure lying right in front of her, she walked up and grabbed for the wrench. She pulled it out with ease. It was just too disturbing to have to do that, but if it could turn on the ink machine then it was worth getting past. Wrench in hand she decided to take a little detour to find all the items and walked over to the projection room. And when she entered, it was as dark and dimly lit as she remembered, but she spotted the Bendy plush she needed on a chair right next to the projector. This had just made her job easier as she grabbed the doll with her other hand and started back to the break room.

Placing the items on their respective pedisals she sighed and got to work on finding the next two. When she found the record she saw a note on the music directors old desk which read “he will set us free.” And if that wasn’t creepy enough while she was walking over to her old desk she found written on the wall in large inky letters “dreams come true.” All she did was try to push past her fears as she gathered the ink bottle and went back to the break room placing the items on their pedestals. And for the last two items she decided to take a quick look down in the small kitchen they had in the studio and somehow she managed to find the book there. The last one she found by the machine as she remembered and with a heavy sigh of relief she said “Ok! That’s all of them!” As she returned back to place them on their pedestals.

But when she went to flip the switch, she noticed a little indicator on the side of the large lever saying low ink flow. Feeling a little disappointed she said to herself, “Now I just need to get the ink flowing somehow. Should be a switch around here somewhere. Then I can start up the main power.” Looking up at the ceiling for answers she noticed an ink pipe and decided to follow that, maybe she could find a way to get the ink flowing again. And after following it into the projection room she found a valve near the back of the room which was exactly what she needed right now.

Once Charlie turned the valve a burst of ink came splashing out of the pipe itself and it continued spurting out ink leaving splashes of ink stains on her shirt. Since this was her favorite shirt she added owing her a new shirt to the list of things she would discuss with Joey. Though at least now that the ink was flowing again she went back to the break room and turned on the machine.

Hoping to find Joey when she went back to the machine, something else awaited her. The doorway was suddenly boarded off and when she tried to get a closer look something decided to pop out of the ink. It was Bendy! But he didn’t look quite right. He was about as tall as Borris and he was dripping with ink like he was made completely out of it and was basically melting right before her eyes.

He swung his hand out pushing her back to the ground. When Charlie was able to get up all of her thoughts were on escaping that studio and surviving that thing. She darted towards the exit noticing on her way that the entire floor was starting to flood with ink as each foot step she took resulted in a loud splash. Finally she could see the exit just in front of her. She reached out her hand in an attempt to grab the handle but before she could the floor beneath her suddenly broke. As she fell her arm cut against a wooden floor board and when she landed, she found that she landed in a large pool of ink. After waiting for a second down there, she realized that she was safe for now but she was worried about how long that would last.


	3. Part 3: What has Joey Done?!?

Charlie suddenly realized the pain she felt in her left arm and immediately checked it out. Thankfully her cut was only skin deep but it still bled out a bit and the stinging from the ink touching her open wound only made it worse. She pulled off her left sleeve and started trying to wrap the wound with her right hand. After she did that she looked around a little bit and found another valve on an ink pipe almost right next to her. Turning it gave her some unexpected results. The room started draining of ink and she found another old cassette tape in a tape recorder on a shelf.

Walking up to it she pressed the play button, it suddenly started to speak:

“It’s dark and it’s cold and it’s stuck in behind every single wall now. In some places, I swear this godforsaken ink is clear up to my knees! Whoever thought that these crummy pipes could hold up under this kind of strain either knows something about pressure I don’t, or he’s some kind of idiot.

But the real worst part about all this.. Are them noises the system makes. Like a dying dog on its last legs.Make no mistake, this place… this… machine… heck, this whole darn thing… it just isn’t natural.

You can bet, I won’t be doing any more repair jobs for Mister Joey Drew.”

**_What the hell did Joey do?_ **

The one question locked in her mind at that moment, and all she could come up with were more questions than answers. All of this scared Charlie and she started to desperately want to either go back home or just wake up and this would all be some kind-of bad dream. But no matter how much she wanted to deny that this was real and it wasn’t all a dream she couldn’t. Every part of her was saying that this horrible situation was completely real and she was now trapped in it.

After a while she finally regained some composure and tried to find a way out of there. The only door upstairs was locked and the only way forward was a stairway halfway flooded with ink. But thankfully she found another pipe and valve which she thought should drain the ink. She had to do this a few times as she went down but that didn’t bother her as much because now she found an unlocked door. When she pushed the door open it opened to a small room.

Charlie stepped in cautiously and saw on a wall written in ink “The creator lied to us.” This wasn’t at all reassuring and the doorway to her right was boarded up so she might as well have been trapped. But then she noticed on her left an axe lying on what looked like a dresser. Looking at it for a moment she said “This will definitely come in handy.” as she picked up the axe and swung it around a little. Holding it in her right hand she walked over to the boarded up doorway and started to cut off the boards.

When the boards were gone she walked through the doorway, down a hallway, and into another room, but this room was a bit different. The only lighting in it was that of six candles standing on the floor on top of a pentagram. Someone lit them recently and she wondered who it could have been. But the other thing she noticed was that there were 3 coffins in the back of the room. She went to explore why they were there when her foot stepped in the middle of the pentagram and images started to flash in her mind. The first was the ink machine, the next was of a wheelchair, and the final one was of the ink monster Bendy standing in front of her reaching his hand out towards her. And then everything went dark as she passed out.

**Author's Note:**

> When I had first said this I don't think I worded it how I wanted to, so I will be updating this story weekly and as I had said before I will be doing so until I finish the story. What I meant was that I am currently working on writing the full story on my computer, and I have been working on this for a while and I am fairly close to finishing it. When I have finally finished it on my computer I will then start updating more frequently. I haven't decided how much more frequently but I am leaning towards once a day. With that all being said, I am glad those of you who read this have been enjoying it so far, and I hope that you continue to enjoy it while updates come out.


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